Privacy Policy

LAST UPDATED: JANUARY 15, 2024

Welcome to the BTI Partners (“BTI”) Website (www.btipartners.com) (the “Website”). This written policy (the “Privacy Policy”) is designed to tell you about our practices regarding collection, use, and disclosure of information that you may provide via this Website and certain related services. Please be sure to read this entire Privacy Policy before using, or submitting information, to this Website.

This Privacy Policy has been compiled to better serve those who are concerned with how their ‘Personally Identifiable Information’ (PII) is being used online. PII, as used in US privacy law and information security, is information that can be used on its own or with other information to identify, contact, or locate a single person, or to identify an individual in context.

Agreement to this Privacy Policy: By using this Website, you consent to this Privacy Policy, including your consent to our use and disclosure of information about you in the manner described herein. Exceptions to this aspects of this policy may apply depending on where you may reside.

Conflict Between this Policy and Local Laws and Regulations: When local laws and regulations require a higher level of protection for your PII, they take precedence over this Privacy Policy. In addition, the specific requirements of this Privacy Policy apply only when local laws and regulations permit.

INFORMATION WE COLLECT ABOUT YOU AND HOW WE COLLECT IT

Personal Information

We collect, and have collected in the past twelve months, information that personally identifies, relates to, describes, or is capable of being associated with a person (“Personal Information”), including:

• identifiers (e.g., name, , IP address, , mailing address, email address, phone number);
• commercial information (i.e. account numbers, purchase history, payment activity)
• internet connection, the equipment you use to access our Website and usage details;
• characteristics of protected classifications under California and federal law (i.e. race, color, sex, age (40 and older), religion, national origin, citizenship status, genetic information, sexual orientation, gender identity or gender marital status, familial status)
• professional or employment-related information (i.e. employer and/or job title)
• Website preferences;
• inferences drawn from the above categories;
• personal information as described in Cal. Civ. Code § 1798.80(e) to the extent collected under another category of Personal Information above.

How we collect this information:

• Directly from you when you provide it to us through this website.
• Directly from you when you visit a sales office
• Third party data sources completing a registration form or through your interaction with a BTI sales counselor
• Automatically as you navigate through the Website. Information collected automatically may include usage details, IP addresses and information collected through cookies, web beacons and/or other tracking technologies.
  • We employ software technology that enables us to track certain aspects of a user’s visit to the Website. This technology helps us better manage content on the Website by informing us what content is effective, how consumers engage with the Website, and how consumers arrive at and/or depart from the Website. The software typically uses two methods to track user activity: (1) “tracking pixels” and (2) “clear gifs.” Tracking pixels are pieces of executable code that are embedded in a web page that track usage activity including which pages are viewed, when they are viewed, and how long the pages are viewed. Clear gifs are tiny graphics with unique identifiers which are embedded in web pages and email messages that track whether or not a user has viewed a particular web page or email message. User activity information may be associated with additional information about a user’s session and Personal Information, if provided by the user.
  • If you arrive at the Website by “clicking through” from another website, then certain information about you that you provided to that other website, such as the terms you were searching on that led you to the Website, may be transmitted to us and we may use it. You should review the privacy policy of any website from which you reached the Website to determine what information was collected by that website and for what purpose(s) you agreed that website could use that information. We may retain information about you provided to us by other websites and will only use it in accordance with this Privacy Policy.
• Targeted and Cross-Context Behavioral Advertising
  • We may work with third-party advertisers, search providers, ad networks (“Advertisers”) to learn more about you and show you ads or other content that we believe would be relevant to you. Advertisers may collect and use information about your use of the Website or services we offer as well as other websites and services. These companies may use cookies, tracking pixels, and other online tracking technologies to collect and use your information. We and/or Advertisers may also append other data to the data collected by Advertisers to create an interest profile of individual users and Advertisers may collect identifiers, commercial information, characteristics of protected classification, and internet information in connection with targeted and cross-context behavioral advertising activity. Our Privacy Policy does not cover any use of information that an Advertiser may collect from you. Advertisements may be shown via the Website or on third-party websites. You can visit the Network Advertising Initiative website at www.networkadvertising.org for information about Internet advertising companies and how to reduce information collection by such companies. Please also see the Additional State Consumer Rights section below regarding rights you may have under state laws to opt out of our sharing of Personal Information for targeted or cross-context behavioral advertising purposes.
• • Social Media Widgets
    • The Website may include social media features, such as the Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, and Twitter widgets. These features may collect information about your IP address and the pages you visit on our site as well as other Personal Information. A cookie may be set to ensure that a feature properly functions. Your interactions with features are governed by the privacy policies of the companies that provide them. Before you choose to interact with these features, you should review the relevant social media company’s privacy policy.

INFORMATION YOU PROVIDE TO US

The information we collect may include:

• Information that you provide by filling in forms on our Website. This includes information provided at the time of registering to use our Website, subscribing to our emails, newsletters, or to receive promotional text messages or phone calls, posting material or requesting further services. We may also ask you for information when you enter a contest or promotion sponsored by us, and when you report a problem with our Website.
• Records and copies of your correspondence (including e-mail addresses, phone numbers, physical address, and other forms of identifiable information), if you contact us.
• Your responses to surveys that we might ask you to complete for research purposes.
• Your non-public personal information such as your name, age, marital status, e-mail address, postal address, state of residence, telephone numbers, and your online activities.
• Your search queries on the Website.
• Information provided to us through social networks or third-party platforms when you, for example, engage with our social media content, or communicate with us via social media (such as your name, e-mail, profile picture, likes, location, friend list, photos or other information described by the applicable social network or platform).

USAGE DETAILS, IP ADDRESSES AND COOKIES

As you navigate through and interact with our Website, our advertising or applications on third-party websites and services, or otherwise engage with us through a computer or mobile device, we may automatically collect certain information about how you access and use the Website, information about the equipment you use to access the Website, and browsing actions and patterns, including:

• Information about how you use the Website, such as the pages you visit, the links you click, the ads you view and click on, your location when you access or interact with our Website, and other similar actions;
• Analytics information to help us measure traffic and usage trends for the Website and to understand more about the demographics and behaviors of our users, including traffic data, location data, logs and other communication data and the resources that you access and use on the Website;
• Information about the computer, tablet, smartphone or other device you use, including your IP address, operating system and browser type, Internet service provider, platform type, device type/model/manufacturer, operating system, date and time stamp, and other such information; and
• Information about how you access the Website, such as the site from which you came and the site to which you are going when you leave our Sites, how frequently you access the Website, when and whether you open emails or click the links contained in emails, whether you access the Website from multiple devices and other actions you take on the Website.
• The technologies we use for this automatic data collection may include a variety of tracking technologies, including cookies, Flash objects, web beacons, embedded scripts, location-identifying technologies, and similar technology (collectively, “tracking technologies”):
  • Cookies (or browser cookies). A cookie is a small file placed on the hard drive of your computer. You may refuse to accept browser cookies by activating the appropriate setting on your browser. However, if you select this setting you may be unable to access certain parts of our Website. Unless you have adjusted your browser setting so that it will refuse cookies, our system will issue cookies when you direct your browser to our Website.
  • Flash Cookies. Certain features of our Website may use local stored objects (or Flash cookies) to collect and store information about your preferences and navigation to, from and on our Website.  Flash cookies are not managed by the same browser settings as are used for browser cookies.
  • Web Beacons. We may place tags on our webpages called “web beacons.” These are computer instructions that link web pages to particular web servers and their cookies.

THIRD PARTY WEB ANALYTICS SERVICES

We may use third party web analytics services on this Website and our social media pages, such as those of Google Analytics.  The service providers that administer these services use technologies such as cookies, web server logs and web beacons to collect information (such as IP address) and use that information to help us analyze how visitors use the Website.  These vendors may use cookies placed on this Website (such as the Google Analytics cookie) and cookies placed on third-party web sites (such as Google advertising cookies), or other third-party identifiers, together, to analyze our Website visitors.

You may deactivate the ability of Google Analytics to analyze your browsing activities on this Website.  To disable Google Analytics, please download the browser add-on provided by Google at https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout?hl=en.  To learn more about privacy and Google Analytics please consult the Google Analytics overview provided by Google at: https://www.google.com/intl/en/analytics/privacyoverview.html

TARGETED ADVERTISING & THIRD-PARTY ADVERTISER USE OF COOKIES AND OTHER TRACKING TECHNOLOGIES

Third-party advertisers, ad networks and ad servers may use cookies alone or in conjunction with web beacons or other tracking technologies to collect information about users of the Website. This may include information about users’ behavior on this and other websites to serve them interested-based behavioral advertising. We do not control these third parties’ tracking technologies or how they may be used. If you have any questions about an advertisement, you should contact the responsible advertiser directly. For information on how to opt-out of certain third-party advertisers, ad networks and ad servers, see the Choices section below.

We may also use third-party platforms and technology, including platforms operated by social networks, such as Google and Facebook to show you interest-based ads. These companies have specific Interest-Based Ads programs that match people that have shown interest in BTI through our websites, stores or other services with users on their platforms and properties. If we participate in these programs, we convert your personal information (which may include name, email address or telephone number) or other information into a unique value which can be matched by those third parties with a user on their platform or with other data they may have collected from you. This matching allows us to deliver interest-based ads to users of these platforms. To opt-out of these ads, you must change your advertising preferences for those third-party platforms. You can manage your preferences for these advertising programs by clicking on the following relevant links: for Facebook click here, for Google click here. These platforms may have their own privacy notices or policies, which we strongly suggest you review.

DISCLOSURE OF YOUR INFORMATION

We may disclose personal information that we collect or you provide as described in this privacy policy:

• To our subsidiaries and affiliates.
• To contractors, service providers and other third parties we use to support our business and who are bound by contractual obligations to keep personal information confidential and use it only for the purposes for which we disclose it to them.
• To a buyer or other successor in the event of a merger, divestiture, restructuring, reorganization, dissolution or other sale or transfer of some or all of BTI’s assets, whether as a going concern or as part of bankruptcy, liquidation or similar proceeding, in which personal information held by BTI is among the assets transferred.
• To fulfill the purpose for which you provide it. For example, if you give us an e-mail address to use the “e-mail a friend” feature of our Website, we will transmit the contents of that e-mail and your e-mail address to the recipients.
• Third parties necessary or desirable to provide products and services that you have requested.
• For any other purpose disclosed by us when you provide the information.
• With your consent.
• We may also disclose your personal information:
  • To comply with any court order, law or legal process, including to respond to any government or regulatory request.
  • To enforce or apply our terms of use or terms of sale and other agreements, including for billing and collection purposes.
  • If we believe disclosure is necessary or appropriate to protect the rights, property, or safety of BTI our customers or others. This includes exchanging information with other companies and organizations for the purposes of fraud protection and credit risk reduction.

USE OF INFORMATION

We collect and use Personal Information for internal purposes, such as to:

• Provide you with our Website and services;
• Process or complete transactions you requested;
• Improve the Website and services, including customization and personalization;
• Notify you of developments and offers via mail, email, telephone, and/or text messaging;
• Communicate with you about the Website, the services, and other matters via mail, email, telephone, and/or text messaging; and
• Compile information and analyses to enhance the customer experience and improve our business; and
• Perform day-to-day business operations such as accounting, seeking legal advice, pursuing or defending legal claims, maintaining information security and anti-fraud programs, and facilitating business transactions with our business partners and clients.

From time to time, we may de-identify Personal Information so that it can no longer be reasonably linked, directly or indirectly, with an identifiable person. We may use and disclose de-identified information for any purpose since it is no longer Personal Information. We will not re-identify de-identified information.

*Service Providers 

We may establish a relationship with other businesses to provide services to us (“Service Providers”), including:

• Online hosting and maintenance;
• Marketing and promotion design and management;
• Communication facilitation such as printing and mailing or telecommunication services;
• Payment processing;
• Management of access to services;
• Data storage and management;
• Data analytics; and
• Identity and contact information validation.

We only provide our Service Providers with the information necessary for them to perform these services on our behalf. Each Service Provider is expected to use reasonable security measures appropriate to the nature of the information involved to protect your Personal Information from unauthorized access, use, or disclosure. Service Providers are prohibited from using Personal Information other than as specified by us.

We disclose each of the categories of Personal Information to one or more Service Providers.

CHOICES ABOUT HOW WE USE AND DISCLOSE YOUR INFORMATION

We strive to provide you with choices regarding the personal information you provide to us.

• Promotional Offers from the Company. If you do not wish to have your e-mail address, cell phone number or other contact information used by the Company to inform you of developments, promote our own or our third-party partner’s offers or services, you can opt-out by unchecking the relevant box located on the form on which we collect your data (the order form/registration form) or at any other time by sending us an e-mail stating your request to unsubscribe@btipartners.com.  If we have sent you a promotional e-mail, you can tell us not to send you promotional e-mail by clicking on the unsubscribe link within the emails you receive from us.  If you no longer wish to receive text messages, you can text STOP to the five digit short code for the text messaging program from which you no longer wish to receive messages (i.e., the five digit number from which the text messages are being sent).

We do not control third parties’ collection or use of your information to serve interest-based advertising.  However these third parties may provide you with ways to choose not to have your information collected or used in this way. To learn more about advertising networks and to opt out of interest-based advertising, visit the Digital Advertising Alliance at www.aboutads.info/choices or the Network Advertising Initiative at www.networkadvertising.org/choices.

REVIEWING, UPDATING AND MODIFYING PERSONAL INFORMATION

Subject to applicable law, you may have the right to request access to and receive details about the personal information we maintain about you, update and correct inaccuracies in your personal information, and have the information blocked or deleted, as appropriate. The right to access personal information may be limited in some circumstances by local law requirements. We may take reasonable steps to verify your identity before granting access or making corrections. You may request to review, change or delete your personal information by sending an email to info@btipartners.com

THIRD-PARTY LINKS

Occasionally, we may link to third-party content, applications, or websites on our website. This third-party content has their own privacy practices. This Privacy Policy does not describe how these third parties collect and use data.

CALIFORNIA DO NOT TRACK DISCLOSURES

How do we respond to Web browser “do not track” signals or other mechanisms that provide consumers the ability to exercise choice regarding the collection of personally identifiable information about an individual consumer’s online activities over time and across third-party websites or online services?

We currently do not respond to DNT signals in browsers because we do not track individual users across the web.

May other parties collect personally identifiable information about an individual consumer’s online activities over time and across different websites when they visit btipartners.com? 

No.

Notice to Vermont Residents

In response to Vermont regulations, we automatically treat accounts with Vermont billing addresses as if you requested that we not share your information with nonaffiliated third parties, and that we limit the information we share with our affiliates. If we disclose information about you to nonaffiliated third parties with whom we have joint marketing agreements, we will only disclose your name, address, other contact information, and information about our transaction and experiences with you.

Notice to Regarding Your Data Rights 

You may have additional rights to access and control your Personal Information as described more fully below. We will retain a record of your request for at least two years and in compliance with applicable laws.

Right to Know 

You have the right to request twice per 12-month period that we provide you (i) the categories and, if requested, specific pieces of Personal Information we collected about you; (ii) the categories of sources from which your Personal Information was collected; (iii) the business or commercial purpose for which we collected your Personal Information; (iv) the categories of Third Parties with whom we shared your Personal Information; and (v) the business or commercial purpose for which we sold or shared your Personal Information.

You have the right to receive your personal data from us in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable form, so that you can transfer it to another party, if you have given us permission to process your data and when the processing was done automatically.

We will process verified requests within 45 days, subject to any applicable exceptions and extensions permitted by law. Please note that if you have a password-protected online account with us, we will fulfill your request via such account; otherwise, we will give you the option to receive your information by mail or electronic delivery.

To request access to your Personal Information. Or a portable version of such information, you may submit a request by emailing info@btipartners.com or call us at (305) 441-2117. You may also designate an authorized agent to submit a request on your behalf.

Right to Deletion 

You may have the right to request that we delete certain types of Personal Information we have collected about you. Please understand that we are not required to honor a deletion request if a legal exemption applies such as if we need the information to complete a requested or reasonably anticipated transaction, prevent security incidents or fraud, enable internal uses that are reasonably aligned with your expectations, or comply with legal obligations. We will process verified requests within 45 days, subject to any applicable exceptions and extensions permitted by law. Please note that if you have a password-protected online account with us, we will fulfill your request via such account; otherwise, we will give you the option to receive your fulfillment by mail or electronic delivery.

To request deletion of your Personal Information, you may submit a request by emailing us at info@btipartners.com or call us at (305) 441-2117 You may also designate an authorized agent to submit a request on your behalf.

Right to Correction

You have the right to request that we correct any Personal Information that we have on file about you that you believe to be erroneous. When you make your request, please be sure to provide us the specific information that you believe is inaccurate and the correct information. You should also provide us with any documentation you believe supports your proposed correction, and we will take that documentation into consideration. We will only correct the information if we determine, based on the totality of the circumstances, that your correction is more likely than not accurate. We may also choose to delete the allegedly inaccurate information instead of correcting it. We will process verified requests within 45 days, subject to any applicable exceptions and extensions permitted by law. Please note that if you have a password-protected online account with us, we will fulfill your request via such account; otherwise, we will give you the option to receive your fulfillment by mail or electronic delivery.

To request correction of your Personal Information, you may submit a request by emailing us at info@btipartners.com or call us at (305) 441-2117. You may also designate an authorized agent to submit a request on your behalf.

Right to Appeal

If we deny your privacy request, in full or in part, you may appeal our decision. If we deny your appeal, you may also contact your state Attorney General to lodge a complaint and we will provide you with an online mechanism to do so. We will process requests to appeal within the timeframes established under applicable law, but typically within 45 days. Please note that if you have a password-protected online account with us, we will fulfill your request via such account; otherwise, we will give you the option to receive your fulfillment by mail or electronic delivery.

You may exercise your Right to Appeal by calling us at (305) 441-2117 or submitted a request via mail at info@ btipartners.com.

Non-Discrimination Notice

We will not discriminate against any consumer for exercising their privacy rights under law or this Privacy Policy. 

Notice to Users Outside of the United States

This Online Privacy Policy is intended to cover collection of information on our website from residents of the United States. If you are visiting our website from outside the United States, please be aware that your information may be transferred to, stored and processed in the United States where our servers are located and our central database is operated. The data protection and laws of the United States and other countries might not be as comprehensive as those in your country. By using our services, you understand that your information may be transferred to our facilities and those third-parties with whom we share it as described in this Privacy Policy.

HOW DO WE PROTECT YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION?

We use many different measures to help protect information transmitted over or stored on our systems. For example, your Personal Information is contained behind secured networks, and is encrypted when transmitted to us via Secure Socket Layer (SSL) technology, to try and keep the information secure. We regularly review our information collection, storage and processing practices, including physical security measures, to guard against unauthorized access to systems.

HOW LONG WE RETAIN YOUR DATA

We retain your Personal Information for as long as we have a relationship with you. We also retain your Personal Information for a period of time after our relationship with you has ended where there is an ongoing business need to retain it. This includes retention to comply with our legal, regulatory, tax, and/or accounting obligations.

Children Under 18

Our Website is not intended to be used by children under 18 years old. You represent and warrant that you are at least 18 years of age. If you are under age 18, you may not use the Website or services. We do not knowingly collect personal information from, or target our Website or services to children under the age 18. We understand that there may be exceptions to this rule including, but not limited to children who are emancipated. If we discover that the Website is being used inappropriately, we will take steps, if possible, to disable access so that the individual may no longer access our Website.

CHANGES TO THIS PRIVACY POLICY

We reserve the right to modify this Privacy Policy at any time. The provisions contained in this privacy statement supersede all previous notices or policies regarding our privacy practices with respect to this Website. Any and all changes will be made here, to this Privacy Policy.

We encourage you to check our Website frequently to see the current privacy policy to be informed of how we are committed to protecting your information and providing you with improved content on our Website in order to enhance your online experience. Upon any material changes to the policy statement, we will post those changes to this Privacy Policy so that you are aware of what information we collect, how we use it, and under what circumstances, if any, we disclose it.

CONTACTING US

If you have any questions about your personal information or this policy, please contact us by email at info@btipartners.com or by using the contact details below:

BTI Partners
401 E Las Olas Blvd Suite #1870
Fort Lauderdale, FL 33301

 PLEASE PRINT AND RETAIN A COPY OF THIS PRIVACY POLICY FOR YOUR RECORDS.